Earthquake
by crazytomboy78
Summary: Sometimes a natural disaster brings people closer together...One-shot, Pepperony.


It was a normal, sunny day outside, but that didn't stop Tony from working in his lab. But his friends had bugged at him to get out of the lab for at least a day and relax and have some fun.

Pepper, of course, was following Tony around. She had been doing that a lot lately, Tony had noticed, but he didn't entirely mind. He never really minded her company; she could make him smile easily. And lately he felt like a smile was just what he needed after everything that had happened. Although, her company was more frequent than it had been, and Tony wondered why. But then he decided not to care—as long as she was there by his side he didn't mind one bit.

But as Tony and Pepper were winding their way out of the compound, they felt the ground beneath them start to shake and tremble. They stopped walking to investigate, but once they stopped Tony realized what was going on. But before he could respond, he saw that a support beam was coming loose and was about to fall, so he grabbed Pepper's hand and ran out of the way, covering her with himself to protect her.

"Tony, what-" Pepper began to ask, but was cut off by a large crashing sound. The quake only lasted mere seconds, but for Pepper it lasted forever due to a combination of fear and the fact that it was perhaps the most romantic moment of her life. Not only had Tony grabbed her hand, but now he was holding her for an extended amount of time. Before he had just grabbed her wrists in similar situations, but this time it had been her hand—to think! Pepper was elated.

Everything went silent then. Nothing seemed to be happening, but Tony and Pepper remained in their little huddle. Tony listened to the silence and felt that everything was still, so he released Pepper and took a few steps back, looking around at his surroundings. Then he felt his phone go off.

"Hello?"

"_Tony, are you guys okay? What happened?"_

"We're fine, Rhodey. It was an earthquake."

"_Well my mom wants you to come to the house." _

"Alright, we'll be right there…" Tony hung up and started towards the exit. However, when Tony came to a door, it wouldn't open. He pushed and pushed at it, and when that didn't work, he tried pulling. But it still wouldn't opne.

"What? How is this door not opening?" Tony turned to find another door that would open, only to come inches to Pepper's face. He hadn't realized that she was standing right there, but now that they were so close he felt all the things he could have possibly said escape his lips and he froze. He couldn't move or speak, just stare at her.

"Oh, umm, h-h-hi, Pepper…" Tony cleared his throat, stepped aside and went to find another door. Before following Tony, Pepper smiled widely and silently chuckled to herself in excitement.

"All the exits are blocked!" Tony exclaimed.

"Probably blocked by debris. It's the structures that are the danger in an earthquake." Pepper explained. Tony looked over to her, confused.

"What? I listened in earth science!" In all truth, Pepper didn't mind one bit being trapped in the compound with Tony, because of just that: it was just her and Tony, alone in the whole compound with only some suits of armor and each other's company. And last time that happened, he smiled at her like she wouldn't believe.

"Well we need to find a way out of here somehow." Tony whipped out his phone and dialed Rhodey to explain that somehow they were stuck in the armory, most likely due to debris blocking the exits.

"Can't you fly out in the armor and remove the debris?" Pepper asked.

"Well I guess I could but I don't even know what the aerial exit is like right now."

"Well that's the only way I can think of. Unless you want to stay in here 'till someone else does it," Pepper said, arms crossed. Tony sighed.

"Fine. I'll try it." Tony and Pepper went to the armory and Tony dawned the armor. Before taking off, he picked up Pepper so he could have her go to Rhodey's house and tell them they were fine.

Pepper, on the inside, was elated to be carried by Tony because it meant that first of all what was better than the crush of your life holding you close to him, and second of all what's better than being held by the crush of your life?

Once outside the armory, Tony cleaned the debris from the exits to the compound and Pepper ran up to Rhodey's house to explain that they were both fine, and that they had to find a way out first because all of the exits that they knew of were blocked by debris, and that Tony was cleaning some of it up and it didn't really look that bad; then went back to Tony.

However, what she didn't see was the piece of debris that was laying on the ground still and that caused her to trip over it, sending her flying into a now armorless Tony. This caused them both to fall to the ground, and when Tony had sworn he felt something soft, almost like lips, brush his. It confused him.

"U-uhhh, s-sorry, Tony I must have tripped over something…" Pepper stammered. She knew for a fact that she had felt his lips on hers when they knocked heads, and she was both blushing and rejoicing in her mind. Not only had she felt it, but she had _felt _it. She knew it had happened.

Tony cleared his throat, stood and helped Pepper up; then they proceeded with the day.

**Eww, that was a stupid way to end it…and I know, I know…I should be updating…but I was kinda getting a fluff-idea buildup and I had to pile it all into whatever the heck this is—and I know it's short. Thoughts?**


End file.
